INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS – A SNEAK PEAK

Intellectual property rights are all about creative products produced or created or invented by the human minds. With the businesses and products growing in leaps and bounds over the years, intellectual property rights are gaining importance as information economy is becoming more and more significant in these times. Information economy is about giving objects created by the mind and not anything physical like land, etc.

The question is how are to protect or prevent others from taking undue advantage of your ideas, creations or inventions. Here is how it can be done.

COPYRIGHT
By copyrighting your product you are preventing it from being copied or distributed. It is approved by law and falls under intellectual property rights. Also known as territorial rights because they are restricted to a certain jurisdiction or territory only and not beyond that. The best part of copyrighting a product is that its extremely easy. No registrations or expenses involved.

TRADEMARK
Trademark or registered trademark is a unique design or sign that is used on a product or a package, label or a voucher. A trademark has to be registered by the owner in their name and then use the symbols like TM for trademark or ® for registered trademark with their logo, symbol, design image or combination of all. On the flip side, trademarking a product does not necessarily mean that the internet domain is also copyrighted.

PATENT

This is generally used when a product is invented and is a right to prevent others from copying it, making it or selling it for a limited period of time. This way a new product is protected by its inventor as an exclusive one and avoids competitors from making or selling the same. Though, it is an expensive affair as it involves a lot of research and fees too. Further, once the patent is granted, possibility of it getting canceled is always there.

INDUSTRIAL DESIGN
Resulting form the materials used or the design, feature lines, shape, textures, etc, it is the monopoly right for a product’s appearance in part or whole. It has to be unique and not similar to any other existing or existed. Though its easy for others to defeat it by making simple or minor changes in the design.